I wrote this for redriverclimbing.com, but I am reposting it here too.

This past Friday, I was climbing Mercy, the Huff. At the 8th bolt, which is, for those who have done the route, right at the lip of the little black rooflet, I made the long move to a crimp, attempted to make another move, and fell. The bolt-side carabiner on the draw had snapped in the fall, and I took a much longer and scarier ride than I was expecting.

Luckily, with a good belayer, and being high up on the route with nothing but air to hit, I was not hurt, other than getting a really big scare. We have taken some pictures and I think have re-created what happened pretty accurately.

This is how the draw was hanging on the bolt. You can’t see it very well in this picture, but the rock is overhanging enough so that the top biner is not touching the rock in any way. I do know that the draw was hanging straight and not snagged on the bolt, because I was shaking out on the jugs right below it for about a minute after I clipped it, so it was definitely not a desperate clip-and-go-without-noticing-that-the-draw-was-snagged scenario. Besides, it is a key-lock biner, the snagged nose usually happens with notched biners. These are the marks on the biner that suggest how the biner was positioned on the hanger when it snapped: Using these marks and a spare bolt hanger, we recreated the likely scenario—in these next three pictures: My best guess is that I had kicked/snagged the draw as I was making the next long move, because the move does take me directly in front of the draw, and I have to stay close to the wall when making the reach. And then, when I fell, the biner snapped, because it is not meant to be loaded this way. I have heard of biners breaking in such fashion, and have been aware of the dangers of the biner being snagged/rotated/cross-loaded on the hanger. What really surprised me is how little force is needed to snap the draw this way. When I fell, the bolt was barely a foot below my tie-in knot. I was at the 8th bolt of an ~80ft route, so there was probably ~75 feet of rope out. With slack and soft catch (yes, it was a soft catch, belayer jumped) I would have expected to fall maybe 7-8 feet. The draw was newish, had only been climbed on a handful of times, and was not notched or burred. The rope—also newish, brand-new last fall, and only had maybe 12-14 days of climbing on it, because the owner lives in Florida. There were no falls or takes on the rope in the 3 days prior to this fall, so you can’t even say that the rope was stretched out from too many subsequent falls in a short period of time, and was thus less dynamic that optimal. I weigh 105 lb. Somebody else can try and calculate the forces, but in terms of climbing falls, this is as light as it gets.

What can be learned from this, and how this could have been prevented? Obviously, in general terms, you have to be very aware of the position of your quickdraw, and you should avoid kicking your draws when you climb past them. But in this particular case on this particular bolt and particular moves —I am not sure.

I went back to send this route on the next go, and even though I was obviously HYPER-aware of that draw, I STILL couldn’t avoid snagging and shifting it with my body as I made the move. I cannot stop and adjust the draw mid-move. The first time I can reach down to make an adjustment is after I reach the next jug. But in that case, if I had reached the next jug, there is no falling, and I can make another move and clip the next bolt, anyway. I have been on this route before, have made the move before, and have fallen there before, without any incident. Considering that this is a redpoint crux of the route for many people, there have been probably 1000s of falls there, and as far as I know biners are not broken right-and-left in this spot, even though I am pretty sure a lot of people do the move the same way I do, and thus have the same potential of getting the draw snagged. I am thinking that a trad draw might have been good in that spot, because even if I snagged/pulled the rope-side biner, the bolt-side biner would probably not have shifted. But who climbs Mercy with trad biners? &#61514; Having a short stainless chain to extend down, so the draw is clipped below the little roof might be helpful, as would be a permadraw, but this is at the Left Flank, no fixed gear, so it’s a moot point.

Opinions, suggestions, and analysis are welcome.

My partner who owned this draw contacted Petzl, but at this point there is no reason to think that this was a defective biner.

The general take-home message for me is to: -double-check your draws, to make sure they are hanging properly and not snagged or twisted -avoid kicking or shifting your draws as you climb past them -look down and double-check that you haven’t kicked them -be mindful of the fact that you really aren’t out of the “danger zone” when sport climbing until you are fairly high up -avoid falling when you have only one draw clipped. None of us have ever fallen on the first draw, right?

Glad to hear you are OK Was the bolt side gate clipped towards the movement, or away? Any estimates how many falls this QD has gone through - perhaps there was metal fatigue or crystallization at work? - might a trip to Case Material Sciences be of interest?

Interesting theory on how it broke. I studied your pics and came up with two unresolved issues.

The lack of a mark on the outside of the tip would suggest to me it may have been wrenched open in a fashion really close to your theorized pics, but with the tip not wrenching against the bolt head. The bolt has a point positioned where this would likely occur.

The other thing that makes me lean away from my hypothesis is the fracture itself. It has clear indications of the nose or tip was in fact pulled away from the spine in some manner. The troubling part is this cannot occur with the gate closed. The first knee jerk is the gate was open, whether the hanger or rock pulled against it, or what really occurred. There is an uneveness to the tearing side to side, but not to suggest a side load, just indicated where the weak spots or stress risers were when the yield started to occur rather than a wrenching torque caused the failure.

Petzl or a metalurgist can likely add much to your solving of the mystery "what done it". Is it practical, not really.

A little unanswered question in my mind, was the fall vertical? Or with some side or outward pull on the draw when the rope came taught? A little jump to make for a clean fall could have perhaps been part of the issues that may or may not have positioned the biner in the perfect wrong position?

I have a background in fracture and failure of metals, although industrial, that makes me just slightly more curious than the average Joe.

Interesting post, and the answer may never be understood. But I can walk away with the reaffirmation that all climbing does have unforeseen risks. When you do everything right, shit can still happen.

Thanks for the quality post and pictures. I hope a newbee or ten fumble through the forum and come across this, and many like it to educate themselves that the unforeseen can and will happen from time to time. Expect it. Also I am glad you enjoyed the ride.

lena, glad you're okay. That's scary shit. I think you're analysis is post on. The digger on the frame near the nose of the 'biner is key. You can see it clearly in the first photo.

Your take-home lessons are right on too. The only thing I'd add is to remember that shit happens. It can happen any time.

Also, as an old trad dude who started by clipping pins, I almost always flip over the bolt end 'biner immediately after clipping. I do this before clipping the rope end. We used to do this to prevent exactly this issue--the 'biner getting hung up in the eye of a pin. I'm trying to quit; it really pisses off whoever gets to clean the draws but, old habits die hard.

Also, as an old trad dude who started by clipping pins, I almost always flip over the bolt end 'biner immediately after clipping. I do this before clipping the rope end. We used to do this to prevent exactly this issue--the 'biner getting hung up in the eye of a pin. I'm trying to quit; it really pisses off whoever gets to clean the draws but, old habits die hard.

"The gate is always down and out." Gee Mal, I always thought it was just me doing that.......

just played around with your suspected setup a little bit and couldn't get any kind of camming action between the nose and basket pivot shown. I didn't have any pretzl biners at my desk though. Did it seem to seat itself in that position? It would seem that it would have to be pretty solidly stuck in that orientation to stay that way when you fell.

Also despite the nature of your post it still made me miss the Red despite a weekend spent in J Tree

lena, I am VERY glad that you are ok. The end result of this could have been a lot worse.

Over the weekend I did a route that had an 80' bolted traverse. As I sat at the belay brining across my second I got to watch the gymnastics performed by the bolt end 'biners at a few of the bolts. Although I already understood how much these things could move, I was reminded that clipping a bolt is in NO WAY a failsafe proposition. More than once I saw each of the carabiners work their way into a position that, in the event of a fall, would have probably resulted in a situation similar to what happened to you.

Thanks for posting this. It is a great reminder (or lesson for less experienced folks) that bolts can become unclipped or damage / break carabiners.

The general take-home message for me is to: -double-check your draws, to make sure they are hanging properly and not snagged or twisted -avoid kicking or shifting your draws as you climb past them -look down and double-check that you haven’t kicked them -be mindful of the fact that you really aren’t out of the “danger zone” when sport climbing until you are fairly high up-avoid falling when you have only one draw clipped.

The point highlighted in blue implies that the point highlighted in green should also apply to the second, third, and often the fourth bolt or even the fifth. However, adhering to such a rule would adversely affect one's performance as a sport climber, which suggests that we should look for other ways to prevent breaking carabiners. We should be careful about not shrugging off the orientation of the draw wrt to the direction of the climbing above it, or the orientation of the biners with respect to each other (the cis/trans debate). Perhaps, when hanging project draws, we should use locking biners on the bolt end or "clip and flip" the top biner.

The lack of a mark on the outside of the tip would suggest to me it may have been wrenched open in a fashion really close to your theorized pics, but with the tip not wrenching against the bolt head. The bolt has a point positioned where this would likely occur.

I didn't mean to suggest that it was the interference/lodging against the bolt head. While it is hard to see in the pictures I posted, the carabiner was not touching the bolt head, even rotated position.

I believe that once the draw was rotated, it was the rock behind it that kept it in this position. I didn't have this photo earlier today, but here is a picture of the markings on the outside of the top broken-off part of the biner.

xtrmecat wrote:

Petzl or a metalurgist can likely add much to your solving of the mystery "what done it". Is it practical, not really.

Petzl will be looking at it, my partner got a response from them in terms of where to send it, etc., but the preliminary hypothesis, based on nothing but the pictures, is something along the lines of what I had reconstructed.

xtrmecat wrote:

A little unanswered question in my mind, was the fall vertical? Or with some side or outward pull on the draw when the rope came taught? A little jump to make for a clean fall could have perhaps been part of the issues that may or may not have positioned the biner in the perfect wrong position?

I am straight in front of the bolt when I make that move, not to either side.

The fall was vertical and unintentional, there was no pushing, jumping away from the rock, etc. I simply made the move, grabbed the bad part of a hold, attempted to bump my hand to adjust the position slightly, and slipped off, falling straight down.

I have tried that move again after the fall, with a new draw, and no matter what i did, and which way I positioned the gate 9 to the left, to the right, rotated, as mal suggested, the draw was bumped when i made the move -- but it didn't get stuck on any of those attempts.

Moreover, I have been on this route before a few times, and I believe that I had bumped into that draw with my torso every time when I had made the move.

This is the only bolt on this particular route where the movement takes me directly over the draw. All other bolts are a bit to the side, away from where the moves are going, but I don't think there is a different place where a bolt could be placed in that particular spot.

xtrmecat wrote:

Interesting post, and the answer may never be understood. But I can walk away with the reaffirmation that all climbing does have unforeseen risks. When you do everything right, shit can still happen.

I agree. I think maldaly made the same point below, and curt had said it, too, in another thread at some point.

You can minimize the risks, you can try very hard not to do stupid stuff, double-check things and be safe, but you can't eliminate the risk completely, and if you think you can, you haven't been climbing enough.

Would this carbiner have been broken if you had climbed the route tomorrow?

I am not quite sure what you mean by it, but the answer is, likely, no. however, I do not think the answer is NO due to anything I would have done differently, but rather due to the fact that getting the biner rotated and stuck this way is not easy. In most cases when the biner gets rotated on that bolt, it simply falls back down, even when I actively and deliberately tied to get it stuck.

The only thing that i can think of doing differently is that I probably would be using a trad draw with a sling instead of a dogbone at that particular bolt, if I climb this route again, because I see no way I can avoid bumping the draw with my torso while making the move.

The general take-home message for me is to: -double-check your draws, to make sure they are hanging properly and not snagged or twisted -avoid kicking or shifting your draws as you climb past them -look down and double-check that you haven’t kicked them -be mindful of the fact that you really aren’t out of the “danger zone” when sport climbing until you are fairly high up-avoid falling when you have only one draw clipped.

The point highlighted in blue implies that the point highlighted in green should also apply to the second, third, and often the fourth bolt or even the fifth. However, adhering to such a rule would adversely affect one's performance as a sport climber, which suggests that we should look for other ways to prevent breaking carabiners. We should be careful about not shrugging off the orientation of the draw wrt to the direction of the climbing above it, or the orientation of the biners with respect to each other (the cis/trans debate). Perhaps, when hanging project draws, we should use locking biners on the bolt end or "clip and flip" the top biner.

See my response to xtremecat, regarding the position of the draw vs. direction of travel.

I was making the move straight up in front of the draws, not to the right, not to the left, with the draw being squarely in the center of my torso.

In this particular case, on this particular draw, I was able to get the draw snagged on the rock regardless of whether the gate of the draw was pointed to the right or to the left, or rotated down.

I agree that on a long-term project in such a case it would be better to hang a draw with a quicklink or a locking 'biner at the bolt end (one of the remedies suggested by Petzl, too).

However, the route I sent 2nd go of the day, after a fall like this, hardly qualifies as a long-term project. I definitely wasn't getting on it with the idea of working this route bolt-to-bolt for a month, falling repeatedly. I've been on it before, I knew the moves and what i was going to do, I intended to send it first go, I certainly wasn't planning on falling when i did fall. But even when I did fall, I certainly wasn't thinking that his was a death bolt ready to break the biner, because I have fallen there before, and nothing indicated that this was going to be any more dangerous than a small clean sport climbing fall.

Only in retrospect I now know that a draw could get snagged there. But in general, on an overhanging route where the draw is not resting against the rock, you are more concerned with the rope-end of the draw and the direction of travel than you are concerned with the bolt-end of the draw.

Moreover, I am not sure how I would be able to, in the future, to know that on any random route that I am getting on there will be a bolt where, no matter what i do, I cannot make a move without bumping into the draw with my torso.

That's why I am thinking in terms of "yes, pay attention to it as much as possible, especially when you are working a route long-term, but you may not be able to prevent it from happening 100% of the time even so"

That's why I am thinking in terms of "yes, pay attention to it as much as possible, especially when you are working a route long-term, but you may not be able to prevent it from happening 100% of the time even so"

I am puzzled by the defensiveness I sense in the snipped material.

I think there are a few practical lessons we can learn from this event. We should learn to recognize situations in which our movements can affect the draw we're passing. and when we encounter those situations, we should protect against them (say, by flipping the top biner), or at least look down to make sure we haven't messed up the draw. At a minimum, we should realize that any time any part of our body hits a draw as we move past it, we should not blindly assume that the draw is just fine. When in doubt it might be better to "take" at the bolt and fix it rather than just climbing past it.

When I look at how you show the draw hanging did you fall out and pendulum left and do the usual bit of twisting in the air?

If this was the top-most biner I could almost see the rope pulling a kink through into the biner and as Lena spun the kink torqued the draw around in the spin, snapped the biner and then unkinked.

If there was slack in the line and I know Lena climbs lead strong enough to want a soft catch that there would be. It's not inconceivable that a kink or twist may have for a moment formed as the rope pulled through (am I on glue?) and then as she fell and twisted with a big ol kink in there that the torque would have snapped that draw the moment the slack took and the entire system loaded. At best that biner would have what... 9KN of breaking strength at most. I'd venture even less if it was torque-loaded.

Anyway, just the thoughts of a person sitting a long, long, long, ways away.

Wow. Thats spooky stuff. Did you have to change pants before the redpoint burn?

I don't have anything to add on the prevention front, other than to mention that the biner might not have been able to bind against the rock in that way if the bolt had been a glue-in with a larger opening and rounded metal surfaces. I'm just talking out of my ass here but having seen how the top biner moves within certain glue-ins and settles back, I feel like the chances would have been less.

Edited to remove a reference to a specific bolt manufacturer. I won't associate their product with my speculations

That's why I am thinking in terms of "yes, pay attention to it as much as possible, especially when you are working a route long-term, but you may not be able to prevent it from happening 100% of the time even so"

I am puzzled by the defensiveness I sense in the snipped material.

I think there are a few practical lessons we can learn from this event. We should learn to recognize situations in which our movements can affect the draw we're passing. and when we encounter those situations, we should protect against them (say, by flipping the top biner), or at least look down to make sure we haven't messed up the draw. At a minimum, we should realize that any time any part of our body hits a draw as we move past it, we should not blindly assume that the draw is just fine. When in doubt it might be better to "take" at the bolt and fix it rather than just climbing past it.

Yes, I think the defensiveness is probably there... not directed at your comments, but mostly because I keep looking back at it and wondering if there was a sign that I didn't recognize, something that is obvious in retrospect now, that should have made me pause and say, O.K., this is not right, I need to fix this.-- And I cannot come up with anything that should have been a red flag.

I think the take-home in GENERAL terms, on every route you climb, every time you clip the bolts and make the moves past them, you should strive to be as aware as possible of multiple things, such as

--direction of travel, --the way the rope runs through the rope-end biner, --the way the bolt-end biner is positioned in relationship to the bolt and the rock surrounding the bolt, - the possibility of kicking the draw and what you need to do to minimize it,

...and then double-check, once you did move past the draw, that it is still in a good position that you visualized it would be, once you moved past it.

I think all of the above are valid, and they are the reason why I posted this in the first place. You can probably add a few more...

But then I go back to that specific route, that specific move... and I can see only couple possibilities that do not involve placing a permadraw there, or screw-gate draws: -- hang a trad draw on that bolt, instead of a regular sewn dogbone, because it would be less likely that nudging the rope-end biner (unavoidable in the move I do) will dislodge the bolt-side biner -- don't climb that route again

When I look at how you show the draw hanging did you fall out and pendulum left and do the usual bit of twisting in the air?

If this was the top-most biner I could almost see the rope pulling a kink through into the biner and as Lena spun the kink torqued the draw around in the spin, snapped the biner and then unkinked.

If there was slack in the line and I know Lena climbs lead strong enough to want a soft catch that there would be. It's not inconceivable that a kink or twist may have for a moment formed as the rope pulled through (am I on glue?) and then as she fell and twisted with a big ol kink in there that the torque would have snapped that draw the moment the slack took and the entire system loaded. At best that biner would have what... 9KN of breaking strength at most. I'd venture even less if it was torque-loaded.

Anyway, just the thoughts of a person sitting a long, long, long, ways away.

Good luck on solving that puzzle.

There was no pendulum at all. The 8th bolt, where the broken draw was, and the 9th bolt are in a straight line one above the other, the moves go straight up (with overhang) and the bolt was squarely in between my knees when I fell.

I don't think the exact details will ever be solved. The Petzl guys have responded quickly, and they will, of course, be analyzing the biner.

The likelihood that this particular thing will happen again on this particular route is really low. My friend who attempted to recreate the biner position was using both hands, and even then it took her a lot of wiggling to get the draw positioned just so, to make it be held against the hanger with the texture of the rock behind it.

Wow. Thats spooky stuff. Did you have to change pants before the redpoint burn?

I don't have anything to add on the prevention front, other than to mention that the biner might not have been able to bind against the rock in that way if the bolt had been a glue-in with a larger opening and rounded metal surfaces. I'm just talking out of my ass here but having seen how the top biner moves within certain glue-ins and settles back, I feel like the chances would have been less.

Edited to remove a reference to a specific bolt manufacturer. I won't associate their product with my speculations

Yes, I think you may be right there, in regards to a glue-in. Luckily, a lot of routes that get re-bolted at the Red to replace aging bolts are now getting glue-ins, and I have no doubt that when Mercy will be rebolted, eventually, it will likely end up with glue-ins, too.

And LOL, no pants stayed clean. But I down-climbed that move once, and did a lot of shaking out and double-checking before I finally committed to it, on the redpoint.

But then I go back to that specific route, that specific move... and I can see only couple possibilities that do not involve placing a permadraw there, or screw-gate draws: -- hang a trad draw on that bolt, instead of a regular sewn dogbone, because it would be less likely that nudging the rope-end biner (unavoidable in the move I do) will dislodge the bolt-side biner -- don't climb that route again

You don't think that flipping the top biner over would have been effective?

But then I go back to that specific route, that specific move... and I can see only couple possibilities that do not involve placing a permadraw there, or screw-gate draws: -- hang a trad draw on that bolt, instead of a regular sewn dogbone, because it would be less likely that nudging the rope-end biner (unavoidable in the move I do) will dislodge the bolt-side biner -- don't climb that route again

You don't think that flipping the top biner over would have been effective?

Maybe it would have. But playing around after the fact, my partner was able to get the biner stuck on that bolt/rock, regardless of how it was flipped and which way the gate was facing.

Of course, that took some trying, it wasn't NORMALLY getting stuck, regardless of which way the draw was facing. But if we tried to get it stuck, it would, with any gate orientation.

I do think that flipping the biner upside-down is a good trick to know and use, especially on routes where you are going to work the move repeatedly, are worried about this kind of possibility, but do not have a locking biner to spare for some reason.

I am not sure that I would be capable of flipping every bolt-side biner on every draw upside-down on a route that is hard for me, but within an onsight capability.

And I am still not sure that I would even reliably recognize the next bolt on which the biner should be flipped, every time I encounter such bolt.

But then I go back to that specific route, that specific move... and I can see only couple possibilities that do not involve placing a permadraw there, or screw-gate draws: -- hang a trad draw on that bolt, instead of a regular sewn dogbone, because it would be less likely that nudging the rope-end biner (unavoidable in the move I do) will dislodge the bolt-side biner -- don't climb that route again

You don't think that flipping the top biner over would have been effective?

Maybe it would have. But playing around after the fact, my partner was able to get the biner stuck on that bolt/rock, regardless of how it was flipped and which way the gate was facing.

I don't know why I didn't think to mention this before, since I do it pretty often, is to place two draws on the bolt with their gates opposed.

Do you generally keep your biners on your draws opposed? I generally clip the bolt end biner in the opposite orientation as IME it has less of a chance to interact with the bolt. In this case you said it got lodged against a rock but is it possible it wouldn't have interacted with the rock in the same way facing the other direction, or as JT512 suggested, flipping the biner?